1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a printing apparatus, a program, a printing system and a printing method.
2. Related Art
Some well-known printing apparatuses, such as copying machines, multifunction peripherals, and printers, have operation modes including a normal mode and a power saving mode in which power consumption thereof is lower than that of the normal mode.
For example, JP-A-2006-272637 discloses a printing apparatus which is configured to, on the basis of a timetable set therein, perform switching between a power supplying mode in which a prompt start of execution of a print job is made possible, and a power saving mode in which power consumption is lower than that of the power supplying mode and a predetermined preparation is needed before transiting to the power supplying mode.
In recent years, environmental requirements have become more sophisticated, and, for example, there have appeared printing apparatuses each having a power saving mode in which, not only electric power supplied to a CPU, memory modules, a printing engine and the like is disconnected, but also network communication is shut off. Hereinafter, a power saving mode in which the network communication is shut off will be also referred to as “an off mode.”
Such a printing apparatus in an off mode can return from the off mode upon, for example, detection of an operation of an operation panel or the like included in this printing apparatus. However, such a printing apparatus in an off mode cannot return from the off mode even when a print instruction has been transmitted thereto from a host, such as a personal computer (PC), because network communication with the host is shut off. In this case, the host detects this situation as a print error.
As described above, a user cannot perform printing unless the user manually operates a printing apparatus in an off mode to return it from the off mode. That is, a user cannot return the printing apparatus from the off mode by means of a remote operation from a host, such as a PC. Therefore, such an off mode is inconvenient for users, and is not utilized even though the degree of power saving achieved by the off mode is particularly high.